Western Scotland birding (1 Viewer)

[alunited1961]

bullfinches

This is not a very exciting report in the grand scheme of things, but I saw a couple of bullfinches flying between trees on waste ground in the Gorbals when I was on the bus to work this morning. Sometimes the unexpected sightings are the best...

Bulfinches are rare visitors to our garden we have a tree/bush which seems to attract them for some reason...

today i saw 4 fledgling blackbirds being fed by their male parent on my lawn

 

[Caledonian]

Yesterday 24th of June quit a good day near the Lochwinnoch Visitor centre.

During my walk around the Barr loch I had an Osprey circling over the loch and later on Hunting on the south end of the loch. Between 9.20 and 9.40 am.

Around 10.50 I discovered 3 common Scoters (2 males and 1 female) on the Barr loch which where the first record ever in the reserve!

Other birdsightings where: 1 female Gadwall, 3 great crested grebe and several tufties on the Barr Loch. several siskin and lesser redpolls, 2 Bullfinch, kingfisher, great spotted woodpecker and other birds during my walk.
Others saw Otter but I missed that one.

 

[JTweedie]

I visited Lochwinnoch yesterday. One guy said to me that it was really quiet, but that must have been apart from the sedge warblers, willow warblers, chiffchaffs, blackcaps, spotted flycatchers, great crested grebes, swallows, swifts, sand martins, lesser redpolls, common buzzards, azure damselflies, common spotted orchids, small tortoiseshell butterflies and many many more!

Rik, when you say you walked around Barr Loch - is there a path right round it? There's a new gravel path along the south-east shore of the loch across from the visitor centre, at the end a faint path seems to continue through the grass along the shore - is this the path you took?

Incidentally, this gravel path was teeming with midges yesterday, when I moved my hand to try and wave them away, I could actually feel the mass of them against my hand!

 

[Caledonian]

Indeed is this the path I mean. You can walk straight ahead of the end of that new gravel path.
Al do it is a very difficult path to walk specialy during this rainy season. You walk trough reed valley's, sometimes up to your knees into the water and on the far end of the Barr Loch you must jump over a 5 feet little river. And ofcourse the clouds of midges.
But overall....... there is a path

Rik, when you say you walked around Barr Loch - is there a path right round it? There's a new gravel path along the south-east shore of the loch across from the visitor centre, at the end a faint path seems to continue through the grass along the shore - is this the path you took?

 

[JTweedie]

Indeed is this the path I mean. You can walk straight ahead of the end of that new gravel path.
Al do it is a very difficult path to walk specialy during this rainy season. You walk trough reed valley's, sometimes up to your knees into the water and on the far end of the Barr Loch you must jump over a 5 feet little river. And ofcourse the clouds of midges.
But overall....... there is a path

Ah, don't think that's a go for me then, looks like I'd need wellies or maybe even waders for that path!

 

[JTweedie]

I had a short walk around Cathkin Marsh today. Very quiet people-wise which is the way I like reserves!

It was quite gusty, but it stayed dry. Got my first whitethroat of the year - this was my target bird there, so really pleased with that! Heard grasshopper warblers, and saw sedge warblers. A common buzzard was hunting kestrel style overhead and a lesser redpoll was flitting in and out of the hedges near the screen.

It's quite a small reserve (you can walk around the whole lot in about 20 minutes), but it was worth taking time to look at the flowers and the insects. I saw lots of northern marsh-orchids and a solitary common spotted-orchid, and a ringlet butterfly and yellow shell moth.

 

[Green Sandpiper]

I was at the Marsh a couple of weeks ago, and was lucky to get Yellowhammer, Meadow Pipit and grasshopper warbler. No raptors, though.

I've always found it worthwhile just to hang around at the Marsh, with the farmland and landfill site surrounding it, there's always something moving about.

Always freezing when I go, though.

 

[alunited1961]

a wee flexi day tomorrow

so trip down the coast fairlie hunterstoun seamill ardrossan and bogside...

 

[JTweedie]

I was at Baron's Haugh yesterday - apart from the usual birds, there was a green sandpiper, over 100 greylag geese, three redshanks, and a dunlin. The latter two species showing that migration is truly on!

 

[smc4761]

What has happened to all the garden birds? I have a bird feeder in the garden and apart from the pigeons and magpies nothing else seems to come anymore. previously sparrows, blue tit starlings would come but for the past 2 weeks the feeder has not been touched. The pigeons do come but cannot get to this feeder

has the weather taken its toll on the smaller birds. Anyone else notice a decline in the number of smaller birds?

 

[Pigeon_Pete]

Garden birds tend to go off feeders when insects/grubs are readily available. It is possible a sparrowhawk has been terrorising them? My feeders (in Ayr) have plenty goldfinch, greenfinch, chaffinch and coal tit. Blue tit numbers are really low as my six nest boxes all failed due the weather :-(

 

[alunited1961]

feeders

What has happened to all the garden birds? I have a bird feeder in the garden and apart from the pigeons and magpies nothing else seems to come anymore. previously sparrows, blue tit starlings would come but for the past 2 weeks the feeder has not been touched. The pigeons do come but cannot get to this feeder

has the weather taken its toll on the smaller birds. Anyone else notice a decline in the number of smaller birds?

The garden birds may also be moulting. I have noticed a drop in starlings and my feeders are being targetted by crows and rooks just now.

 

[bongofury]

Its the opposite here. I'm filling the sunflower heart daily - unknown during July - mainly due to the Siskins. Dunnocks and Blackbirds are visiting frequently, along with moulting Magpies and the usual array of tits, chaffinches and goldfinches.

 

[allanpcameron]

The wee boogers are eating me out of house and home. There's a flock of about 20 sparrows that empty the two suet feeders every day. Gold, chaff, green and bull finches, along with sundry great and blue tits (fewer coal tits recently) finish off three sunflower heart feeders. Plagued by pigeons eating eveything that falls to the ground. Starlings, jackdaws and magpies all have a go at the other suet block. I had a gs woodpecker feeding a young un, which was excellent. All of which brings the sparrowhawk through regularly. There's been the usual dunnocks, wrens & robins, blackbirds on the ground in the garden, with a couple of wood pigeons making up the numbers. Last summer I had a willow warbler that would fly out and mob the finches as they came away from feeders, tyring to get them to drop. But it wouldn't come to the feeder itself, would be great to that on my garden list again.
The whole thing is costing me a fortune!

 

[Andrew1998]

Hi

I'm new to this forum and live in lanarkshire 10 mins away from Barons Haugh and have been overjoyed by a nuthatch which has graced the feeders the last few days.
I have a garage in the garden which I've been using as a photography hide. There is a nut and nyjer feeder just few feet from "the hide" and on the edge of the minimum focusing distance of my sigma 150-500. I also have a seed feeder aswell. During my holiday 2 weeks ago a tree had fallen not far from home and when I got back some of it's branches were still there. I had a look at the branches and chose a branch with a fork and was covered in lichen, this was perfect. So far I have used this to photograph Blue,Coal and great tit . I have unfortunley not had much luck with the nuthatch, well that was until tonight. The last few seconds of decent light was all I had left when the nuthatch flew into the back of the garden then came closer as it landed just 15 feet away. It looked unusually wary as it darted into a bush to watch the young blue tits pile on the feeder the just as the last light went and was getting ready to pack the camera away the nuthatch crawled along a branch into the open just 10 feet away. It was a strange sighting as it moved just 5 inches within 5 minutes as it studied me closely before finally jumping onto the feeder then turning upside down and smashing a nut through the feeder a bit like an upside down woodpecker.Really happy to get a few photos of it. This is probally in my top 5 favourite momments ever so really happy with the nuthatch. I have also had Bullfinch at the feeder which is unusual here as they tend only to come in spring to take the buds off our apple tree. Had our first Greenfinch, Siskin and Goldfinch back in the garden all with chicks.

It seems a few others are having to fill the feeders up constantly aswell as this is a bit unusual for me.

 

[bongofury]

Hi

I'm new to this forum and live in lanarkshire 10 mins away from Barons Haugh and have been overjoyed by a nuthatch which has graced the feeders the last few days

Well done Andrew with getting the Nuthatch into your garden. One day they will spread across to this side of the Clyde:t:

 

[Andrew1998]

Thanks Bongofury. I was talking about nuthatches to the local birding group and one of them thinks nuthatch may have bred at Chatelherault this year . I know this is ment to be Western Scotland Birding but I'm so overjoyed at seeing that White-rumped-sandpiper at Tyninghame today as it approached me as I photographed it and dulin from a distance of about 15 foot. I waited till the dunlin flock walked past me and got a good 40 feet away before leaving so not to flush them.

 

[bongofury]

I'm so overjoyed at seeing that White-rumped-sandpiper at Tyninghame today as it approached me as I photographed it and dulin from a distance of about 15 foot.

I was across there on Tuesday for the Semi-P and had similar good close-up views of it and the Dunlins. Strange how that bird departed one day, only to be replaced by the White-rumped the day after. Great site.

 

[alunited1961]

walked around Cumbrae on sunday and spotted a young whitethroat got some close up pictures, very pleased as it was a first for me another to add to my list lol

 

[Caledonian]

This morning 1 Adult winter Med gull and 1 juv Med gull present near the harbour of Inverkip showing very nice.